Amanda managed a weak smile. I guess a hot shower when you want one is a privilege of rank.
“I’ll arrange for someone to show you around,” Edmunds said.
“RV back here at sixteen hundred,” Gant said to Amanda.
She waited until he left. “It looks like you’re snowed under.” She gestured to the cluttered desk. “Please don’t worry if it’s not convenient. I can find my own way.”
“Not at all,” Edmunds said. “I can use a break, but let me show you the base layout first.” Using an aerial map, she pointed out the main facilities; the chow hall, the gym, the shower block, and where to find the Officer of the Day—or Police. But she was welcome to call on the lieutenant for anything she might need during her stay. Edmunds explained that Amanda would be sharing the quarters of a U.S. Army nurse and one from The U.S. Navy. And although Commander Gant was able to make use of the showers now, the next window of opportunity open to the female troops was between sixteen and eighteen hundred.
Before entering the wooden building, Edmunds put a finger to her lips. Inside, two of the four beds were surrounded by makeshift curtains. One of the other two, nearest the door, had a pillow, sheet, and blanket lying on the top. Its curtains were currently tied out of the way against the wall. Edmunds helped Amanda make up the bed and before leaving, whispered that she would locate a guide for the hospital and Amanda should meet them there in thirty minutes. At the foot of the bed was a lockable trunk into which Amanda placed her bag and safety gear. She grabbed a pack of wet wipes and gave herself a quick bird bath.
It was now just after two pm and Gant wanted to meet up again at four. She gave up trying to work out the time difference between here and California but the jetlag told her she’d been awake for a very long time. And as much as she wanted to get her head down, now was the optimum time to tour the hospital.
She put the bag back into the foot locker and closed the lid but didn’t lock it. Biting her lip, she stared at it for a moment, then opened the lid and took an envelope from her pack, folded it and put it in her back pocket. She secured the padlock, then retraced her steps to the hospital.
The man standing near the entrance to the FST pinched out his cigarette and threw the butt in a bucket of sand. “Amanda Wilks? Captain Mike Dubois, anesthesiologist.” His perfunctory greeting was delivered with a stern face.
“Thank you for agreeing to show me around, Captain. Even though I’m sure you are a busy man and have more important things to take care of.”
He entered through one of the double doors. “My pleasure, ma’am.”
It sounds anything but.
In the vestibule between the doors to the outside and another set into the tent, Dubois stopped. “So, the Ice Man’s thawed enough to permit an embed to tail him?”
Amanda tilted her head. “Are you referring to Commander Gant?”
“Got to admit, you don’t look like an embedded journalist.”
“Oh. No, I’m a Critical Care Nurse. I work with him at the MJK.”
“But you’re a civilian.”
She briefly outlined the exchange program and how the opportunity for this visit had arisen.
With a warm smile, he held open one of the interior doors for Amanda. “Gail—Lieutenant Edmunds—neglected to mention that you’re a nurse.” They came to a room containing four examination tables and trays of medical supplies, along with specialist medical equipment to treat traumatic injuries.
“Triage?” Amanda asked.
“Correct. Injuries are assessed and prioritized here.” He led the way through another set of doors. “This is the OR. We can run two tables at the same time. We also have a basic X-ray machine.” He guided her down an interconnecting corridor between two tents. “This brings us to ICU and Recovery. There are eight beds, but mercifully we’ve never had them all occupied at the same time. We have two men in here, right now. A GSW to the head and a bilateral amputation of the lower limbs. Three patients were MEDEVAC-ed to Kandahar this morning. We’re hoping these two will be stabilized enough to fly out tonight. We only perform damage control here. We clean them up, patch them up, and ship them out. If they arrive here alive they have a ninety-seven percent chance of staying alive.”
“Amazing.”
“Yes,” he said in a flat voice. “Nothing like war for advancing medical techniques. Please be quiet traversing this next part, there are two surgical team members sleeping in the Rest Area.”
“I really hope you weren’t woken up to conduct this tour.” You look dog-tired.
He raised a finger to quieten her and Amanda trod lightly past the occupied cots and ended up in another brightly lit small room where a man in t-shirt and shorts was on the telephone and working on a computer at the same time.
“Inbound?” Dubois asked him.
The man shook his head. “Supply.”
Dubois addressed Amanda. “This is the Control Center. We get notified of inbound casualties here. How many, how serious, etcetera.”
He showed her out and directed her how to get back to the front of the building.
Amanda held out her hand. “Thank you, Captain, for the phenomenal effort you all put in. I can’t imagine what it’s like to work here.”
Dubois shook her hand. “Mike.” His stern expression returned. “Stick around and you’ll find out.” He strode back into the hospital.
Amanda patted her pocket. Damn, I meant to ask him. Ah, maybe that guy knows. She walked over to a man who was engaged in some leg stretches. “Excuse me, can you tell me where I can find Gunnery Sergeant Torres?”
“Never heard of him.” The man slung a rifle over his shoulder and jogged away.
She asked two others if they could direct her to Gunnery Sergeant Torres. The first shrugged and the second delivered a curt, “No.”
Rivera had told her his unit was currently patrolling out of FOB Bulldog and he’d like to let them know he was OK. He’d tried phoning and texting several times, but couldn’t get a signal. On the FOB, internet for personal use was intermittent so he’d written a letter and asked her to deliver it. Checking her watch, there was still over an hour before she was to rendezvous with Gant, so she headed back to her quarters. A further request for directions was met with a blank stare. She took the letter from her pocket. Maybe I should ask Will to deliver it. Dammit, no! Rivera tasked me with it.
While staring at the name on the letter, she’d walked right past her hut and come to a makeshift gym beside a hut where a bearded, bare-chested man was engaged in pull-ups on a scaffold frame. She stepped in front of him. He paused at the top of the lift with his chin clear above the bar, watching her.
OK, one last try. “Do you know where I might find a Gunnery Sergeant Ángel Torres?”
He dropped silently to the ground. “Who?”
Even though Raul aided her in the Spanish pronunciation—Anh-hel TOH-race—she still stumbled over it. Why couldn’t he have been called John Jones? With a sigh, she pulled out the envelope and read out the name—this time as Angel Tor-rez—and the APO number written on it.
Because of the beard, she’d taken the man for a civilian but as he drew near, one of the two necklaces he wore turned out to be black dog tags. The other was similar to Rivera’s; a bullet on a leather thong. He walked over and stood a little too close for comfort. Amanda flared her nostrils at the smell of his sweaty, dust-covered torso. She took a step back. The man leaned in a little closer. She took another step back and the edge of the building dug into her shoulder. Enough. She moved sideways and began walking away from him, scuffing her feet in the dirt.
“Wait up.” He ran in front of her. “What business would you have with the gunnery sergeant?” he asked in a slow drawl.
She held the letter under his nose.
He laughed and headed toward the hut. “Come with me.”
When he turned, she got a good view of the tattoo across the back of his broad shoulders; an arch of Gothic letters that spelled out USMC. On his left uppe
r arm was a tattoo depicting a pair of combat boots and a rifle with its bayonet stuck into the ground. On the butt of the rifle was a Kevlar helmet and a pair of dog tags. Under the design were the words, ‘Fallen but not Forgotten’. She followed him back to the hut.
He opened the door a crack and called inside. “There’s a mail call—” He laughed again. “Belay that, there’s a female call for one of you guys.”
The door was thrown open from the inside and another unshaven, bare-chested man bowed theatrically and beckoned her to the threshold. A livid pink scar above his right eye traced its way into his eyebrow.
Amanda glanced at the tall bearded man. “He’s in there?”
“It’s OK, ma’am,” he said with a nod and a smile.
She took a deep breath and went inside the plywood hut, expecting to find an office, but as her eyes adjusted from the bright sunlight it became apparent she was actually in their sleeping quarters. She also wished she hadn’t inhaled quite so deeply as she was hit by the stench of testosterone, stale farts, cigarettes, and guns.
The Beard followed her in and pulled the door almost closed behind him.
The beads of perspiration trickling between her shoulder blades itched like mad. Don’t give them the satisfaction of knowing how uncomfortable you are. She lifted her chin. There were five equally sweaty and dust-covered men, all in various stages of undress. And none of them had seen a razor in a while.
The one sitting in front of her, wearing only combat trousers, was wiping down a rifle balanced on his open knees. He stopped cleaning it and looked her in the eye. She stared into the path of an impending thunderstorm and inhaled the ozone of an imminent lightning strike. In an instant, she managed to take in his eyes; green with hazel flecks, his muscular physique, another of those necklaces (what are those things?) and dog tags (why are they all wearing black ones?)—and, of course, the ubiquitous tattoos. An intricate sunburst on his left upper arm and on his right, a native (Aztec?) warrior in full regalia carrying a sleeping—or injured—maiden. On his left breast, he had a small tribal art jaguar.
A man lying on a cot stood and for a horrifying moment Amanda thought he was about to drop the towel around his waist, but he was able to adjust its fit without exposing himself. “We don’t take embedded journalists, lady.”
“I’m not a journalist.” He’s wearing a bullet too! What is it with those things? Me gung ho macho.
From the far side of the room, a fifth voice called, “So who are you?”
“Amanda Wilks. I’m a Critical Care Nurse.”
Towel Twister placed both hands over his heart. “You had me at nurse. In fact, you could—”
“Fig,” Seated Man said keeping his gaze directed at Amanda, “button it.”
Scar Face addressed her. “You say you have something for one of us.”
“Yes,” Amanda said, still looking at the seated man. “I’m looking for Án-hel Torres.”
“Why?” Seated Man asked.
“I have a letter for him.”
He held out his hand. “I’m Ángel Torres.”
His captivating pronunciation made Amanda cringe at her own clumsy attempts. Oh, God, it had to be you, didn’t it? Her heart beat faster. Their fingers brushed for the briefest moment in the exchange and the lightning struck. The tingle traveled up her arm and exploded in her brain. She uttered a small gasp, and dragged her eyes away from him, expecting to find the others laughing at her, but no one else seemed to have noticed anything unusual. Amanda massaged her fingers. Was it only me that felt that? How did he not?
He tore open the letter and began reading. The men exchanged inquiring glances and hand signals. Without raising his head he said, “OK, ladies, unwad your undergarments. It’s from Rivera.”
This elicited much cheering and clapping. “I recognized that scrawl right away,” The Beard said. “What’s he say, Angel?” He said the name in the anglicized meaning of a heavenly being. The men gathered around him all asking questions at once.
Angel held up a hand to silence them. “Says he will throat punch the first one of us that calls him ‘Hop-a-Long.’”
“Challenge gladly accepted,” said Towel Twister with a smirk. “Anything else?”
“That the leg’s doing good.” Angel’s terse answer was greeted with murmurs. He broke into a wide grin. “He’s getting about on crutches now.”
Whooping and cheering, the men swapped playful punches.
Angel continued to read to himself.
“What else?” Towel Twister asked.
“Nothing.”
Towel Twister peered over Angel’s shoulder. “Man, it takes a whole page of Spanish just to say that?”
“You dickwad, O’Malley,” said Scar Face. “He means the rest of it is none of your business.”
Angel folded the letter and looked back up at Amanda. He stroked his neatly trimmed beard, a smile flickered across his lips and he mumbled, “You got it, ése.”
O’Malley addressed Amanda. “Have you been taking care of him?”
Amanda nodded absently.
“How is he . . . really? We got word he didn’t lose his leg. And of his promotion, but we’ve not gotten any recent updates.”
She tore her attention away from Angel. Not knowing what information Rivera had decided to share, she played safe. “As he said in the letter, he’s doing well. He’s getting about on crutches now and has added swimming to his rehab routine.”
That was greeted with another riotous reaction.
“You’re British, right,” Scar Face said. “Did you take care of him at Kandahar?”
No, I work at a military hospital in the States.”
“Pardon me, ma’am,” said The Beard. “But you don’t look military.”
Amanda put her hand on her chest. “Goodness me, no, I’m not. I’m accompanying a Navy surgeon, but only in an observational capacity.” She shuddered. “Though had someone told me how the aircraft land, I might have rethought the whole idea.”
The men laughed at that. O’Malley doffed a pretend hat. “It takes some pretty big cojones to come all the way out here as a civilian. Shit, to even set foot in this country!”
She checked her watch to hide her reddening cheeks. Almost an hour had passed since she left the FST. “Oh, my. I have to go. I’m meeting Commander Gant in ten minutes. I can’t be late.”
Angel sat forward so quickly he had to grab the rifle to prevent it sliding off his knees. “The Navy surgeon is Commander Gant?” He sat back with a smile and winked. “Be sure to tell him I owe him a drink.”
“He says it was down to your medic who treated Rivera at the scene. He says he stemmed the bleeding and got the shock under control.”
“He’s one of the best in the business,” said The Beard in a quiet voice from behind her.
“Everyone there that day was one of the best in the business,” said Angel. “They all had a hand in saving him.”
She glanced at her watch again.
“Yes, you better leave,” Angel said. “The Commander does not like to be kept waiting.”
The Beard opened the door and O’Malley offered her his arm. “May I escort you back to wherever it is you’re going?”
“Like that?”
He gave her a mischievous wink. The Beard put himself between O’Malley and Amanda and ushered her outside. “Don’t mind him. He’s harmless.”
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